Today marks Topher’s 2 years from being discharged from the NICU and finally going home. He “celebrated” with his final appointment with his Physical Therapist as well as his Early Interventionalist at home. Topher will start Preschool in the Fall with Franklin County at the Early Childhood Learning Community (near our church) off of Garrett Street. There he will continue to receive PT, OT and Speech Therapy on a weekly basis in a classroom setting. We’re looking forward to school. Supposedly, kids with speech delays really bloom in the school setting where they are surrounded by their peers.

We saw Dr. Mc G this morning for Topher. She wanted to follow-up on his eyes to see the effectiveness of his contacts. If you recall, Topher has a 6.5 point difference between his right and his left eye. Dr. Mc G said that at his last appointment in February, she was already seeing signs that showed he was favoring his left eye which is his stronger eye. Today she checked to see how well his eyes reacted to interruption (covering one eye) while he was focused on a toy. She was happy to see that both eyes seemed to be coordinated (instead of having one wander off) and that there was no preference of usage. So both eyes are developing okay and the contacts are working. We’ll follow-up with her in another six months.

Topher got his first pair of contacts on March 29th. It’s been almost two weeks since he’s had them, and we’ve lost (and found!) them 3 times already.

The most common question we get is: How do you put contacts on a 2-year old? Well, it’s really a two-person job. One person holds him down (sitting on him is preferable because it prevents getting kicked in the head) while the other person puts them in or takes them out.

Topher got Rigid Gas Permeable lenses (aka “hard” lenses). At first, we thought he’d be getting soft ones, but after seeing how challenging it is to get Topher to cooperate (prying eyelids open on a screaming and wiggling toddler is NOT fun!), I can understand why we have hard lenses.

With hard lenses, putting them in is as “simple” as prying his upper eyelid open and then “sliding” them in. As for removing them, they just pop out when you get his eyelids open enough. Soft lenses would require us to “pinch” them out instead.

It used to take Shane and I about 20 minutes to remove them. Now it takes about 1 minute. We’ve learned that the faster everything happens, the happier Topher seems.

Now for the little “miracles” of these past 2 weeks: remember how I said we lost them? Topher’s right lens seems to be the “problem” lens. The first few days, it would always slip off to the edge of Topher’s eye. And that’s also the one that keeps getting lost. On his second day of having them, he must have rubbed it out, because when we tried to remove his right lens, it wasn’t there. Luckily we found it in his crib.

Three days later, on Friday, the right lens went missing again. This time, Shane found it in the dishwasher while he was rearranging the dishes to be washed. Thankfully we found it BEFORE he started the load!

The third time he lost his right lens, I found it in the pantry on top of the dog food storage container. Now we check his eyes every 60-90 minutes. We also check them before we leave the house, and before we head home from errands. It’s a little paranoid of us, but at $125 per lens per eye, it’s worth it.

Topher turns 2 today. His actual “corrected” age is 20 months, though. We plan on celebrating in Traditional Tsai fashion: going out to eat! And also bringing a few friends along to join in the food fest.

In honor of Saint Patrick’s Day, I’ve been posting limmericks on Facebook.

(Gotta warn you, they’re not that great, but progressively get better…)

Shane and I have always joked about how cute Topher is, and how much cuter he would be without his glasses. Well, God has answered our prayers, kinda sorta…. Topher is getting CONTACTS!

Topher had his annual appointment with his Opthalmologist (can you believe he’s been wearing glasses for a whole year now???). His right eye is now VERY nearsighted (he prescription went from -8.00 to -16.50) and his left eye is a bit worse, too (going from -6.5 to -10.00). Because of the 6 point difference between each eye, glasses would not correct his vision. Actually, the way Dr. McG put it, if he wore glasses, his vision wouldn’t make a proper image, so his brain would just “shut off” his right eye and ignore the vision it sees. This can cause “lazy eye” amongst other eye problems. The official term is “ambliopia” (sp?). So with contacts his right eye would still continue to work with his left.

Thankfully his retina is still stable from his laser surgery. Also, the curve at which his vision progressively gets worse is supposed to be steep the first few years for preemies. According to his opthalmologist, he’s at the top of the curve. So hopefully by next year, the worsening of his eye sight will have tapered off.

We have another appointment next month to get him fitted for his lenses. They make special ones where you can keep them in 3-4 days at a time. Doctor Mc G tried to reassure me that little kids get used to the lenses quickly by telling me of a 4-year old who puts her own lenses in all the time. Hmmm… I’m not sure how cooperative Topher will be when the time comes.

In other news, Topher can now moo, except it sounds more like “voo.” 🙂

This WAS Topher’s central line (aka a broviac). It was surgically removed yesterday (February 18th). Now he just has a single stitch in its place and a small dressing to keep the area clean.

We still have to wait about a week before he’s allowed a tub bath. He’s been getting sponge baths for the last three months. And he gets his fill of splashing with the water fountain at church(it’s low for the little kids of ChildCare).

This is Topher happy:

Btw, for everyone who says that Topher looks like Shane, *I’M* the one who scrunches up my nose like that when I smile, not Shane… 🙂